


Data Corruption

by SpicyCheese



Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Alzheimer's Disease, F/F, Grief/Mourning, Harold losing his memory- this is not a feel-good fic, M/M, Memory Loss, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-15
Updated: 2016-05-15
Packaged: 2018-06-08 15:55:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,553
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6861736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SpicyCheese/pseuds/SpicyCheese
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>“But what if I build a machine with lots of memory, one that could think?”</i><br/> <br/><i>“Well, even if you could Harold, even if you could fill it with all my memories, it still wouldn't be me." </i></p><p>(Please mind the tags)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Data Corruption

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [Data Corruption 既失既忘 (Translation/翻译)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6889351) by [sandunder](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sandunder/pseuds/sandunder)



> I thought, 'You know what would be incredibly sad? A fic about Finch starting to lose his memory.' So I wrote it. Here- have some pain.

*_*_*_*_*

 

"There are many, many things that can cause the symptoms you've described, Mr. Kestrel. Have you been under any increased stress lately?"

You smile, but he doesn't get the joke.

It's a great risk coming here, even with your carefully constructed identity. You knew that, without a comparison image, the MRI results would not be conclusive, and yet...

Your eyes can't help but return to it. The image mounted on the light board behind the doctor looms ominously- a terrifying Rorschach of worst fears come to life. The small, dark voids pictured seem to pull at you. How much longer before past and present will be swallowed whole by them?

You thank the doctor, and grab your hat. You make a follow up appointment with the secretary that you’ve no intention of ever attending.

For some reason, minutia vies for attention as you make your way out. Little details irk you. The fading covers of dated magazines in the waiting area. The scuff marks on the hospital floor. The empty sound of your shoes echoing in the corridor. The elevator doors close and the air inside feels as stifling and dated as the rest of the building. You make a note to ensure the hospital receives a hefty anonymous donation towards renovations. The wear and tear is starting to show.

The envelope with your images feels heavy in your hand, and the weight of it drags you back to a different time.

As a boy, you built a machine to help prompt your father with reminders for the things forgotten. You wanted to help him the best way you knew how. You remember his sad smile when he told you that things just didn't work that way.

_“But what if I build a machine with lots of memory, one that could think?”_

_“Well, even if you could Harold, even if you could fill it with all my memories, it still wouldn't be me.”_

As the elevator approaches the lobby you look up at the security camera. It blinks back at you once, almost solemnly, and you wonder how quickly the Machine connected all the dots. You wonder if your medical files have already been accessed, a treatment plan already formulated, the many variables taken in and your life expectancy calculated. You wonder if the Machine has already picked out a memory care facility, for when the time comes. You wonder if it’s in New York or Iowa.

Mostly you wonder when She will come to terms as you did, as your father did, that not everything that’s broken was meant to be fixed.

 

_____

 

You’re surprised.

After Samaritan falls, after the blood has dried and the explosions echo their last, you find it’s the quiet that frightens you the most. Now you have time, time to think, to ruminate, to feel. You almost wish you had a new war to wage because the silent one that has already started inside you weighs far heavier.

You start to work the numbers again. Ms. Groves insists there’s no need, that the new assets she’s acquired are quite efficient, but you know what you need.

You need a purpose. More specifically, you need a job.

 

_____

 

Sometimes you think of Nathan.

He once chided you about your decision to erase the Machine’s memory nightly, stating that our memories make us who we are.

You wonder, if you lose them, who do you become then?

You’ve lived as a ghost for years, as a man without a name, one that technically didn’t exist. Perhaps this is simply just the next step in that evolution.

_____

 

You catch yourself making mistakes, small ones that no one but you think twice about. They are errors others write off as stress, confusion easily marked down to anxiety. You play them off easily enough. It’s mostly Ms. Shaw that notices. She suggests you take a few days off, and the way she stares as she says it makes you wonder how much else she notices.

 

_____

Sometimes you think of Arthur.

Now you understand that the continual pain he felt was less ongoing grief for memories lost, and more the crisp, clear awareness that you’re losing them. And that there's nothing that can be done about it.

Your files are corrupting.

In his last hours, the Machine showed Arthur the wife that was taken from him, swallowed by those black voids in his own mind. He was afforded a goodbye to what he loved most dearly, right before he slipped away. You wonder who She will show you.

_____

 

You fret for weeks over what and how to tell John. You obsessively practice and rework every permutation of words. It consumes you. When you finally tell him it’s on the park bench near the bridge. You felt it fitting to bring it full circle, announcing your end near the spot where it all began.

You’re not sure what reaction you were expecting, but the barely noticeable furrow of his brow, and only that, was not it. Something twists in your gut as you wonder if maybe you’ve misjudged what was between you all this time. That perhaps that closeness you’ve come to feel was yet another trick of the mind. Your face drops, and the words slip out unbidden, “You don’t seem particularly upset.”

You watch as the brow's furrow deepens. He opens his mouth to say something, but closes it again quickly.

And then you understand. “You already knew.”

He nods in affirmation.

“Did the Machine tell you?”

He looks away for a moment, gathering his words, and the reaction you had anticipated (or sickly hoped for- hoped because of what it would affirm) settles in the lines of his mouth. And then you understand. The realization is crushing.

“I already told you didn’t I?” 

Panic grips you, you didn't think it had progressed this far already, that you're already losing entire conversations.

He nods and meets your eyes once more. “You were talking to yourself last week, falling asleep at the computer. I didn’t want to bring it up until you were ready.”

“Oh,” you breathe, trying to quell the beating in your chest. It's not as bad as you'd feared but his affirmation still wakes the reality you'd kept sedated and now it comes all at once. It's just too much.

“John, I'm- I’m not ready.”

You wonder when you became this man- the one who lets panic and fear consume him on a public park bench, who sobs openly for the world to see.

You’re not sure what you expected, but the solid arms that envelop you are the only things you need in that moment.

  
_____

  
He is at your side when you tell the others.

Ms. Shaw twice blinks and nods once. Nothing on her face has changed but you can almost hear the speed with which her mind is whirring. Med school rotations and textbooks are recalled, calculations fuse to hard facts and observations. She reminds you of the Machine in that way, calculating and precise, moving through options and treatments, solution focused. Like you, she knows her strengths, what she can do, and how she can best help. And like you, she puts her faith in the efficacy of tangibles rather than more ambiguous emotions.

While Ms. Shaw seems to have shifted her posture so that she's even more solid and composed, Root simply crumbles. Her face has a distinct twitch at the news, like she’s been tased slightly, before falling slack once more. She turns and leaves without a word.

When she returns, three days later, it’s late at night. She says nothing but the gentle thrum of her pulse where her hand settles on yours speaks volumes.

 

_____

 

The Machine has begun prompting you. She texts reminders when She notes a misstep and little touchstones when She senses an increase in distress. In short, She is worried.

You understand. You know how hard it can be to watch a parent slip away.

 

_____

 

John anticipates your needs better than even the Machine can and you don’t know why this surprises you still. Why he surprises you still.

No matter how many times it's happened over the years, you never expect it when he saves you- when he puts his life on the line for you. You don't expect it now, but he does just the same, knowing you have put him in danger but returning to you every day regardless. Now, it's less bullets aimed in his direction and more the the occasional verbal barbs you let slip, but each blow you land likely stings him just the same.

  
_____

 

Root glitches like a core piece of her has malfunctioned, vacillating between overbearing and aloof.

Over time, she finds a place she can manage to exist with the truth of it, taking solace in the small programming projects you work on together. Her focus on you is rapt, clinging tightly to the dregs of your mind (to the dregs of you) and you find yourself wondering about love. What she feels for you is far different than her love for Ms. Shaw, and different still than for the Machine.

Conversely, you find your feelings toward her and the Machine very similar- protective, guiltily responsible, and somehow strangely proud. Proud of what they've both become _despite_ you and what you thought best for them. You are so grateful for that.

You hate whatever it is you mean to her though, watching it hurt her as she experiences your slow disappearance. On your easy days she is effervescent and when you converse with her she seems so full of life and purpose. On your harder days she seems lost, and when you yell at her she looks as if she’s 10 years old again. That look shatters you, the pressure in your chest feels like it could splinter your ribs, and you would rather die than continue to be party to this hurt.

So many people have left her, you insist on sparing her that pain again. Though no matter how many times you beg her to leave first, to go and not look back, she won’t.

She just won’t.

 

_____

 

You spend an hour on Tuesday morning looking for your glasses.

You continually forget the entrance code to the new base of operations.

You spent all day growing increasingly annoyed when everyone continues to ask if you're okay...And then you remember why they're asking and it is so much _worse_.

 

_____

 

  
You’re not sure who’s more stubborn, you or Sameen. It would seem the latter though as you continue to acquiesce to weekly check-ins and monthly tests. Through the process you’ve come to understand that which Root has likely known for a while, that Sameen wears her concern (for lack of a better word) in her subtle actions. It's broadcast in the slight narrowing of her eyes as she documents your data and test results. It's drummed out in the staccato of her routine questions. You think it a strange irony that the trait that ended her medical career is the same one that likely allows her to continue treating you, to continue delivering the cold and clinical truth with the same even measure as everything else. 

She's the best doctor you've ever had.

The other two will need someone to anchor them. Someone that can be a hammer as well as a scalpel. You are thankful for her.

 

  
_____

 

You throw the chess pieces into the river when you catch John letting you win again.

Unacceptable.

 

 _____

 

Grace visits you. You’re not sure why everyone seems so upset when you tell them.

 

_____

 

You try and go to work but you can't find your security clearance card. You've been arguing with the incompetent clerk, who has been unable to find your name in the employee directory, for almost 20 minutes before John arrives. You're not sure what story he tells the IFT security manager on scene but it seems to do the trick and you're allowed to leave. Your system is failing. Data will likely be lost for good soon. 

 

_____

 

Your doctor always looks angry, but is never rough with you. She answers your questions with a calm and even tone and never flinches, even if you get angry and impatient. She is surprisingly good at calming you down. You apologize yet again for your behavior and make a joke that if she has a special someone at home, they are very lucky to have her.  She actually smiles at that. You’ll have to remember to ask about them next time.

 

_____

 

The computer program the woman named Root introduces you to is quite remarkable. You can have a full conversation with it even. It shows you videos and just about anything else you can think of or ask for. It really is quite an incredible feat of programming. If you see her again, you’ll have to ask her who makes it.

 

_____

 

You wake up on a couch, head pillowed on the shoulder of someone far taller than you. Movie credits roll on the TV screen, and the iridescence accentuate the dark circles under his eyes and make his salt and pepper hair seem to glow.

He's warm and familiar. His name is on the tip of your tongue. You apologize for the drool, you were just so tired.

He chuckles, suggests you might be more comfortable in your own bed.

You settle back where you were. His suit jacket is soft on your cheek as you drift back off.

 

_____

 

You’ve never owned a dog before so you’re not sure why the doctor has insisted you babysit her new puppy. She even tells you to name it, says she has to travel a lot and doesn’t have the time. You find this highly irresponsible (and tell her this) but she leaves it with you all the same.

It destroys several books and 3 shoes before lunch, but you realize you’re smiling even through your verbal reprimands. Maybe that’s why it refuses to leave your side. You’re prone to the classics so you’re not sure why but you name him Lionel. Seems like a good name for a loyal companion.

 

_____

 

That woman tries to kidnap you again. You manage to hit her a few times with your keyboard before your friend John appears and intercedes. For a murderer and a thief she certainly seems to cry a lot.

 

_____

 

You don't understand, you don't understand, you don't understand.

You wish these people would stop asking if you're okay. You have to leave for college in three days and there's so much to do. And no one will let you phone your father, you need to make sure he's okay. You're all he has.

 

_____

 

You remember a boy named after a bird. You remember you and your father taking the field guide and pointing out sparrows or woodpeckers or finches. You recall wishing you could fly away with them.

You wonder if Florida is nice this time of year.

Maybe you’ll visit someday, but for now there’s work to do. You have an idea for a Machine, one that might change the world. You can't wait to tell Nathan.

 

*_*_*_*_*

**Author's Note:**

> I thought of this a while back in season 3, but since 5x01 I just couldn't let it go.


End file.
